Vodafone UK income falls by 3.2 per cent

Almost one million customers using 4G in the UK and outdoor population coverage now sits at 40 per cent

Vodafone’s revenues fell by 3.2 per cent in the UK for the three months ending June 30 as group revenues grew by 6.2 per cent to £10.2 billion on a year-by-year basis.

Quarterly UK income was down by £48 million from £1.52 billion to £1.472 billion between April and June while organic group revenue declined 4.4 per cent. UK service revenue fell by 3.2 per cent on an organic basis for the first time. These figures included Cable and Wireless Worldwide (CWW) following its purchase in 2012.

Vodafone added 80,000 customers over the quarter bring total customer numbers to 19.5 million. 900,000 customers using 4G in the UK and outdoor population coverage now sits at 40 per cent.

The group, who are the world’s second largest mobile operator, said the results showed stabilisation across the European sector as the rate of decline slowed. It blamed a slowdown in Spain and South Africa for the fall in key revenue.

The group highlighted strong progress on Project Spring, its £19 billion network investment programme, which has seen its 4G footprint across European markets grow to 52 per cent. 6.7 million customers at Vodafone are now using 4G, with group data traffic up 73 per cent year-on-year.

Chief executive Vittorio Colao said the results were in line with Vodafone’s expectations, adding: “Through our commercial actions and investment, our performance is beginning to stabilise quarter-on-quarter in several of our European markets, with customer appetites for 4G clearly growing.

“In unified communications, we have made further good progress on our strategy continuing to implement our plans in several markets, and our customer growth trends demonstrate the strength of our commercial execution.”